Festival Review: 2017 Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival

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Just like that Bay Area, one of the biggest music festivals inched our way closer to closing out the summer music festivals for this year. We needed to take a day for ourselves to recover but we’re ready to give you the lowdown while the topic is still hot. We’re still bitter about a few things (ahem, A Tribe Called Quest) but we’ll get to that.

This year marks the tenth anniversary for Ranger Dave and the entire music festival itself. It’s hard to imagine that it’s already (and only) been ten years since this concert existed. Throughout the years, the festival was able to bring in some up-and-coming to huge artists such as Kanye West, Chance The Rapper, Elton John, Lionel Richie and more. As for this year? Didn’t disappoint but there would be some that will consider this year to be a “weak” lineup… Can’t see why when you have Metallica and The Who, legends in their own right.

But that didn’t necessarily bring everyone to dropping $300+ ASAP. Three day wristbands JUST sold out a few weeks before the festival began which was both surprising and unsurprising feat considering in recent years, Ranger Dave was able to sell out within the first few days.

Was it because the lineup was a pretty split dynamic with no love to the younger side of the spectrum? Sure, you had Kaytranada, Solange and even Action Bronson but was that enough for people to run and get hyped? For us, YES. For others, when speaking to them, not so much. It seemed there was a gloom with a few people around who were there to just experience the ~festival vibes~ and others who legit liked the music.

Here were some of the highlights from the weekend:

A Tribe Called… No Quest to OSL

With a cancellation on Friday due to “unforeseen travel issues”, there was hope for a Saturday appearance scheduled for 7pm on one of the big main stages… Until just less than ten minutes before they were about to take the stage, OSL announced they won’t make ANY appearance. Granted, there were disgruntled fans who specifically bought tickets to the show for them. Enter Claude VonStroke to come to the rescue to play a SECOND set.

1) We are deeply disappointed that we’ve just been informed A Tribe Called Quest will not make their scheduled performance at Outside Lands.

In the middle of Lorde’s set, (which, by the way, was epic in the freezing cold and fog) she brought out Jack Antonoff who performed just a few hours before her on the same stage. Together they covered Paul Simon’s “Me and Julio Down By The Schoolyard.”

Image Credit: Ashley Bulayo | The Young Folks

Action Bronson: YOU GET FOOD AND YOU GET FOOD!

As we were trekking our way through the festival field, we ran into the middle of “An annotated guide to eating well with Action Bronson” on the GastroMagic stage. Packed set and understandably, we could see why. With people literally hanging on trees for a chance at free food and edible goodies, this was a set that was both entertaining and a bit informative.

Do you know the way to… Baconland?

The main reason we trekked past Action Bronson’s cooking set was to find Baconland… Which was literally nowhere to be found. Although it was mapped out to be next to GastroMagic… All we found was Choco Lands and Cocktail Magic. Does this land even exist? We will never know. Let us know if you were able to find it.

The New Barbary

In an effort to accommodate the most people as possible, folks on the OSL team decided to put out a major screen outside the comedy tent for those who couldn’t find their way into enclosed area. MAJOR PROPS. This helps out literally anyone who has to trek from one end of the venue to the Barbary in time to catch their favorite comedians.

Image Credit: Ashley Bulayo | The Young Folks

Food, Food, MORE FOOD!

This year we set a goal to check out as many food vendors as possible and boy, did we succeed. We’ll go in depth on this in another post but the major winner of this contest goes to Woodhouse Fish Co. We just read that it’s been there for 7 years so, yes it makes sense. For anyone who missed out, the lobster roll, although expensive, was WELL worth it to try!

Metallica loves OSL!

Consider this a check off our bucket list. Seeing Metallica live was not only incredible to hear but the fire/fireworks made it an intense stage setup – it was something you couldn’t dare miss. Even if you were only seeing them for a bit. They brought out a new side of OSL that we personally haven’t seen in a while of mosh pit fun, head banging craziness, and good vibes of absolute rocking out to the legends.

Thundercat + Kaytranada

In an absolutely great decision to place Thundercat in front of Kaytranada, Twin Peaks stage was the place to be for a good two hours. Back to back, both acts put out the best upbeat tracks to dance along to and had the crowd swaying in subtle dance moves up until where couldn’t hear anything anymore!

Overall, it was a chill but entertaining Outside Lands. Thanks, Ranger Dave. See you next year!

Ash is a teenager trapped in a twenty-three year old body. She owes everything she's learned to Lizzie McGuire, Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Unfabulous. She's a pop culture fanatic so yeah, she tend to pray to the entertainment lords begging for MTV to finally hire her. When she's not updating her dog with her life stories, she tweets some pretty cool things from time to time.